


You Are the Music in Me

by AlrightDarlin (WhoopsOK)



Series: The Foxhole Kits [3]
Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Andrew Minyard Has Feelings, Everything is Beautiful and Nothing Hurts, Family Fluff, Friendship/Love, Gen, Healing, Inspired by Music, Mentions of non-sexual age play, POV Andrew Minyard, Platonic Relationships, Team as Family, Tooth-Rotting Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-09
Updated: 2019-12-09
Packaged: 2021-02-26 06:34:30
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 6,015
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21729124
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WhoopsOK/pseuds/AlrightDarlin
Summary: The Foxes have made him a playlist which shouldn’t mean anything. It should be corny and stupid; something he blandly acknowledges and never opens again.(Andrew’s relationship with Spotify and the Foxes.)
Relationships: Andrew Minyard & The Foxes, Minor or Background Relationship(s)
Series: The Foxhole Kits [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1288151
Comments: 42
Kudos: 119





	1. Shuffle Playlist

**Author's Note:**

> This started out with just Seth and Matt, but then I got to thinking about everyone else, too, so here we go! These musical head canons are only vaguely inspired by Nora’s post and mostly me just making them up based on music I know!
> 
> Title from High School Musical
> 
> Also: I don’t think I ever explained, but as in the other fics, the [words in brackets] are a gloss for America Sign Language. If the grammar is odd, it’s meant to be because they don’t have formal teachers and aren’t fluent, not an attempt at ASL grammar.

Andrew doesn’t have a favorite kind of music.

Even before, when he was younger, he didn’t really care one way or another what was on the radio. In foster care, radios were just noise, a way to hide his movements through a house before trouble could pinpoint where he was. Later, as long as it was as loud as possible, loud enough for him to focus on nothing but the sound—not his situation or his body—it didn’t matter what sort of music it was.

Even now, he maintains that he doesn’t care about music one way or another, so he finds it immediately suspicious when Nicky starts pestering him to get a Spotify. He’s been bugging him for over a week now and it’s only because of their newly improved/improving relationship that Nicky doesn’t ask Neil to start in on him, too. Part of Andrew appreciates that, but it’s also slowly encroaching on irritating; Nicky has never been one for subtlety.

Be it far from Andrew’s desire to give Nicky the indication he has any sort of control over his younger cousin, but he’s beginning to wonder if holding out just to be difficult is more trouble than it’s worth. It takes him a lot of talking within himself and a call with Bee to decide to ask him plainly. Telling himself that Nicky has never once lied to Drew, especially not with his hands.

[Why?] Andrew signs. It clearly catches Nicky off guard, but Andrew waves his hand before Nicky can speak. [Stop. Truth, not excuse.]

Nicky cycles through several emotions, ending on realization. He’s a little teary when he raises his hands, but they’re not sad tears. He’s sensitive and he’s just been given an understanding of what Sign means to his cousin, what _Nicky signing_ means. [Want share,] he answers jerkily. [We made something for you.]

Andrew pauses at that. Nicky has learned not to say please, but his eyes haven’t quite managed it. [We?]

Nicky’s hands raise to answer, but he falters in thought. [E-v-e-r-y-o-n-e,] he spells slowly.

[Everyone,] Andrew signs, face blank.

Repeating the motion enthusiastically, Nicky nods. [Everyone sharing. No trick-or-treat,] he signs and Andrew finds that funny enough that he doesn’t correct him. He holds out his hand and Nicky’s grin is worth it in a way Andrew never would’ve found it before. His cousin squeezes his fingers, something as intimate as a hug from anyone else. [Speak?] he signs, and Andrew nods, because he’s getting better, but they’re both far from fluent.

“I’m gonna step out, ok?” Nicky says softly, in the sweet voice he uses when they’re little. “Text me your username when you choose it. Or if you just… want me back.”

Andrew doesn’t comment on the fact that he never actually _said_ he was going to make an account. They both know he’s going to. He arches his eyebrow at the way Nicky fumbled his words at the end there, but otherwise says nothing. He nods and Nicky kisses the back of his hand before swiping his keys off the counter, finger waving on the way out the door. Andrew takes a moment to decide he’s okay with that, with one more way to accept affection without it crawling the wrong way over his skin.

Downloading Spotify only takes a few minutes, but deciding on the name is more of an endeavor than he would like to admit. Though, when he texts it to Nicky, he instantly gets four follows and a text from Nicky telling him to check his profile.

Andrew sees “ _The Monster Mashes_ ” playlist and it doesn’t mean a thing to him at all until he hits play and immediately has to _stop_ , because he _feels._

When he realizes what it is, it stops him dead in his tracks. He has to shut his laptop and just breathe for a few minutes. The Foxes have made him a playlist which shouldn’t mean anything. It should be _corny and stupid_ ; something he blandly acknowledges and never opens again.

And _yet_ he opens up the playlist again, managing to scroll through it, in spite of the steady, warm squeezing in his chest.

It’s every single one of the Foxes’ favorite songs; the songs Andrew has heard them sing the loudest, with the biggest smiles on their faces or in their most tender moments. The songs that Andrew associates with them being happy and loved and they _noticed_ that. They haven’t made jokes about him being unfeeling in _ages_ , but now they’re actively noticing and acknowledging the ways he cares, because he does _care_ and they _see that_ and— It’s hard to breathe around the shape of that stinging in his throat.

Still, Andrew presses play and has the kindest series of flashbacks he’s ever experienced.


	2. Hypnotize – System of a Down

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “I’m just sitting in my car and waiting for my girl.”

The dorms have become a free for all lately, the doors rarely locked and people coming and going all throughout the day.

At first, it was a lot for Andrew’s nerves to take, but his territorial stonewalling doesn’t last longer than the feelings of _Us_ and _Them_. They’re all Wymack’s kids, sharing space is what they _do._ And so the Foxes have become _his_ , too; having them in the dorm doesn’t feel like an invasion. It’s weird accepting that they feel the same, that he’s welcome just as much as he welcomes them, but… it’s nice. He can comfortably sit on the floor in Aaron’s dorm half-watching him and Seth play some bullshit platformer that makes them curse like sailors with every new trap.

Then Matt comes through twirling his keys, on his way to pick up Dan and Neil from their leadership conference. Aaron stretches and mumbles something about taking Katelyn to the movies. He threads his fingers through Andrew’s, catching his gaze before he stands.

“Want company?” Seth asks Matt as he bumps Aaron’s knuckles.

“Sure,” Matt answers, looking over at Andrew. “Wanna come with?”

Andrew doesn’t actually care one way or another, he thinks first. Then he thinks that’s not true. He’s coming off a tense week, helped down from a full-blown episode by spending a little night behind his binky, his kitty, and the nearest kind shoulder. He has a variety of kind shoulders, these days, and he’s not ready to be away from them just yet. Especially when they’re taking him to his most favorite.

They don’t always expect him to speak, not now that they know what to look for; he stands to join them. The space they make for him is still novel, but welcome, as they make their way down to Matt’s truck. Seth hesitates a second when he automatically goes for shotgun, but Andrew…Drew is the littlest of the three, of course he’s riding in the back. There’s a squiggle of something fluttering and warm in his chest when they both turn to check on him when he buckles in. He flicks his seatbelt at them and Matt snorts as Seth rolls his eyes.

The radio roars on when the engine starts, but Matt turns it down with an absent apology a second later. It keeps droning on in the background as they drive, but Andrew is mostly tuned out. To be honest, he’s sort of caught up on the fact that he feels safe enough with them—even with someone else driving—to space out to the familiar sounds of their voices. Their conversation is mostly washing over him by the time they park outside the building, Andrew only half-listening to them argue casually about a book they’d read in high school until a song comes on the radio that makes them both freeze.

Andrew tunes back in just in time to see both of their eyes light up, knowing grins splitting their faces.

Matt actually starts laughing. “That is _fucking_ hilarious,” he says as Seth starts playing the air guitar, giving a twangy vocal imitation of the tune.

Andrew reads the title scrolling across Matt’s dash, but it means jack shit to him, he doesn’t recognize it. He doesn’t even get the chance to ask about it before Seth is belting out, “ _Why don't you ask the kids at Tienanmen Squaaaare!!!_ ”

Matt picks up the next verse before it turns into a free for all.

There are moments that it occurs to Andrew that he is a little brother.

When he first stepped into Wymack’s little space, when he first signed [ _Dad_ ] at him, it was embracing a whole family. He’s been thinking about it like that and it’s so good some nights it scares the shit out of him. But also, on an individual level, Drew has big brothers and sisters now. It’s not always about _looking out for_ each other, sometimes they’re just together, in the ordinary way ordinary families get to be.

In the backseat of Matt’s truck—Matt and Seth rocking out, screaming at the top of their lungs, “ _I’m just sitting in my car and waiting for my girl!!!_ ”—Drew feels like a little kid hanging out with his cool older brothers.

Andrew is thinking that they aren’t _little_ right then, but they both look so young and so untroubled it’s flashbulb beautiful. For that shining moment, Andrew doesn’t feel like he’s standing slightly outside himself, outside the experience. He doesn’t know the words to the song, doesn’t even know who’s singing, but the drum beat is vibrating his chest and Seth and Matt’s smiles are shaking his heart. He blinks and looks out of the windshield to find Dan and Neil have stopped on the sidewalk. A confused smile is twisting Dan’s face as she watches her boyfriend thrash around the front seat, Seth pounding on the dashboard. Neil just looks confused.

As one, they look past them directly at Andrew and Dan just bursts out laughing, holding onto Neil to stay upright.

Matt looks up like he heard her and rolls down the window, a bright smile on his face as he leans out to end the song for her. She can’t stop laughing, but kisses him through the window before she crawls in the backseat after Neil.

“Hi,” Neil says and smiles like sunlight when Andrew flicks his eyebrows up and takes Neil’s hand after briefly brushing his fingers against Dan’s.

It was a good day.

For a day where nothing really happened, it was such a damn good day.


	3. Born This Way – Lady Gaga

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “A different lover is not a sin, believe in capital H-I-M.”

Andrew doesn’t acknowledge fear often, rarely admits he feels it when there are other bigger emotions he could focus on instead. For instance, when he thinks about being gay, he doesn’t think about fear for himself.

It was a long and dysphoric road to accepting that, but he doesn’t get _scared_ about it. There are things he allowed himself before and now he has Neil who is such a fucking pipedream, Andrew has to focus on not letting the awe creep up the back of his throat and choke him. Yes, the awe that this is his and he gets to keep it, but also the awe that someone so combative and woefully stupid has survived this long. Neil doesn’t need his fear, he’s got a rabbit’s foot.

But it’s not often Andrew thinks about _pride_ either.

For as much as Nicky is proud of himself and who he is, Andrew knows there are still moments when he recognizes exactly what a novel he is, they _both_ are. The fact that they have men they love and are _legally_ allowed to marry is a miracle some of the generations before them couldn’t have even imagined. There are people even now—people who have made themselves intimately, _violently_ known in their lives—that would deny them that, take away their lives if they could. Nicky knows this and has still chosen to live as loud and brightly as he can. Andrew keeps his eyes on the people around them, keeps knives up his sleeves and his hands ready to make fists and doesn’t think about how that’s fear. He’s never thought about pride.

“You know,” Nicky says one day, too casually to be completely honest. “I’ve never been to the Pride Festival here.”

Aaron is still working on himself, but has come miles from where he was. He looks up with no disgust, doesn’t even have to fight it down. “…Do you want to?”

Nicky looks over at him, trusting like Aaron has never snubbed him before. “I think I’m going to.”

Though he doesn’t say it like a question, it does come across as an offer. When he looks over to Andrew, for a moment neither of them knows how to tell what exactly the other is feeling. Andrew isn’t sure himself, he’s never thought of _pride_ ; it seems performative, but… Nicky is goddamn tired of being afraid. He grew into himself even after the attack and Andrew doesn’t like the idea that he’s somehow _stopped._

“When is it?” he asks and hates (no, no he doesn’t) how Nicky’s face lights up immediately like that’s some kind of answer (it is).

Neil fares worse in crowds than Andrew does, but he agrees to go, too, even if they both stand out wearing solid black. Renee comes with them, Nicky swinging her hand between them, talking about the lovely pastel rainbow she’s touched up in her hair. She looks at Andrew and smiles when he slowly closes his eyes at her, not able to verbally admit how it’s stupid, but he feels safer with her eyes on Nicky, too.

There are a lot of fucking people here and it’s blisteringly hot, but Nicky is having a blast and it’s written all over his face. And then his body, too, when he stops by every merch table he passes, excitedly talking to anyone who stops long enough to speak to him. Aaron, Andrew, and Neil stay behind him like shadows, Aaron and Neil very wide-eyed about this whole thing. Renee and Nicky wind up getting stopped by a non-denominational something-or-other, holding their hands through a prayer of love and acceptance or whatever when Aaron disappears. Andrew is scouring the crowd for him after about five minutes, not exactly worried yet, but preferring to keep tabs on him.

When he spots him, Andrew’s chest clenches because Aaron is looking right at him, wearing a _stupid_ t-shirt that reads “ _GOT YOUR BACK_ ” in rainbow brackets. Nicky had already been half-tearing up the whole time, hugging just about anyone who looks at him with the same awed and lost expression of someone finding themselves in another person. However, when he sees Aaron, the swimming feeling in Andrew’s stomach must be too much for Nicky to take, because he starts bawling. Aaron permits him a hug looking a little touched himself; Andrew finds this whole thing a little nauseating, but.

But Renee is forehead to forehead with a woman as they pray softly, all about God’s love and no condemnation.

But Neil is holding Andrew’s hand and nobody is staring, even though Neil can’t stop staring himself.

But Nicky is living loud and proud and _out_ and it’s not going to cost him his family, not ever again.

But Andrew… Andrew may be feeling something about all that, the one more way they aren’t alone in this.

Nicky is spinning towards Neil, grinning and maybe a little sunburnt, looking like a living rainbow. He’s singing at the top of his voice as he tosses a boa around Neil’s shoulders, “ _I’m on the right track, baby, I was born this way!_ ” Andrew doesn’t intentionally smile, not quite, but his mouth quirks more than enough for Nicky to look over at him and actually scream. He stops singing to sign frantically, [Hands, Drew, hands!!]

Andrew takes his hands, lets him jump to the beat.

By the time the parade is over, Andrew is well and truly sick of being around other humans, but the further they get from the crowd, the more the edges of his nerves smooth down. Nicky is still riding high and even as he complains about his sore feet, he dances his way into the dorm and Andrew feels for him, right then. Not to say that Nicky wasn’t already firmly lodged in his heart, but there’s something about the night of their first pride that is in high definition in his memory.

When Andrew thinks about being proud of being gay, Nicky’s face is the first thing that comes to mind.


	4. We’re All in This Together – High School Musical

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “Together’s where we belong. We’re all in this together.”

It isn’t often that Andrew hangs out with the girls, not as a group anyway, which is probably why they asked him in the first place.

Allison is sitting on the counter, bouncing her heels off the cabinets softly. He thinks she likes making innocuous noise, especially when nobody here is going to snap at her for it. “We’re going to the thrift shop over on 9th,” she says. “I’ll buy you gelato.”

“ _It’s already cold!_ ” Dan shouts from the other room, aghast.

Andrew looks at her blandly. “You just want me to drive you.”

Allison shrugs at him, smiling. “We’re going whether you drive or not, but I haven’t ever been in your fancy, new car.”

There’s a thought. It doesn’t bother Andrew or anything, but there is something to be said for him carting around the people he cares about. It’s odd that she counts now, it is every time he remembers it, but not unpleasantly so. He glances over when Renee comes in to lean against the counter beside him. When he doesn’t move, she nudges her shoulder again his.

“That’s the high society way of saying she wants to hang out,” Renee tells him in a stage whisper, smiling when Allison kicks out at her, the tip of her toe barely connecting her thigh.

It’s not really like he has anything better to do. So he drives over to the eclectic little shop, stuffed to the gills with all manner of merchandise for reselling. They’re chattering—well, the girls are chattering with the occasional Sign from Andrew—and trying on clothes when Dan gasps. Andrew turns in time to see her bouncing in place. “Alli!”

Allison comes over to stand beside her at the shelf, pushing her hair back as she leans over to see. Then her face splits into a grin. “Jesus Christ, I forgot about _Snow Patrol_.”

“Language,” Renee says, but excitedly wanders towards them, too. She smiles when Andrew catches her hand on the way past, tugging him along.

The bookshelf is heavy with CDs that have all seen better days, marked down to a quarter of the price. There are artists Andrew vaguely recognizes, but he honestly doesn’t care too much, is spacing out again when Allison shrieks under her breath. She’s struggling to pry an album out of the bottom shelf.

“Have we talked about my phase? I went through a _phase_ ,” Allison babbles excitedly.

Renee is giggling and shushing her as she leans down to grab it for her. “I bet you still know all the words.”

“Wow, was that really _2006_?” Dan crowds in to read around her arm. “Aw man, I’m feeling nostalgic now.”

“We’re getting old,” Allison agrees fondly, turning the album over in her hands.

Andrew looks at her. “Too old?” he asks, and all three girls turn to look at him, confused for a split second before their faces all brighten so much Andrew— _has to look away_ —rolls his eyes. How could littles be too old for something?

It’s a bit too chilly out, but Andrew lets the windows down anyway as they go screaming down the highway, “ _Wildcats, sing along!!_ ”

Dan leans into the front seat. “Can I touch you?”

“I’m driving _,_ ” Andrew says flatly.

“I asked first!”

“How?”

“I wanna kiss your cheek!”

Andrew spares her a glance, considers blowing through the yellow light. Instead, he slows to a stop and leans towards her, “Yes.” She smells sweet and familiar and doesn’t linger on his skin before she leans back.

“ _We’re all in this together!_ ” Allison shouts, blowing a kiss at him.

It’s a tacky song. It’s a tacky movie, too, he finds out later on the girls’ couch, eating the gelato Allison promised him.

Still, he comes to associate every song in it—and the way Allison and Dan definitely remember all the words—with the word _affection._


	5. Sunday – Les Friction

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “If no one stops me now, I’ll get through somehow.”

Kevin comes into the dorm looking nervously excited which is odd in and of itself.

Generally speaking, Kevin has melted into having a personality that could be classified as human, but _excited_ is not really an expression often seen on his face. He also tends to bypass nervous directly into borderline-hysterical when the situation calls for it. The faint surprise Andrew feels is visible on Neil’s face.

[Princess?] Andrew guesses, continues at Kevin’s nod. [What?]

[Allison told me Renee was here,] Kevin signs hurriedly.

Andrew points at the bathroom and Neil calls over his shoulder. “Renee, Princess is looking for you!”

“ _Coming!_ ” she shouts back over the sound of the faucet.

It’s only a few seconds, but Kevin looks like he’s damn near to wiggling in place from the wait. His eyes light up when she comes into view, already smiling at him and arms out for a hug. “Hi, Princess!”

“Ne,” Kevin greets her, his nose in her hair. He doesn’t step out of her arms when she pulls back to look at him. “Are you busy this weekend?”

Renee tilts her head at him, boops his nose because she always does when he looks cute. “Never too busy for you,” she says, when he flushes happily. “What’s up?”

There’s the question he wanted, because his smile wavers like an excitable little boy. He goes fishing in his back pocket to pull out an envelope, pulling out whatever’s inside to hand to her.

Andrew watches Renee’s whole demeanor change from her general level of happy-to-see-you to genuinely ecstatic. “ _Les Friction?_ ”

Kevin nods, beaming and shifting on his feet. “Do you want to go with me?”

The answer is Renee bouncing in place before she tosses her arms around his shoulders. He laughs again and Andrew is stuck on that, how easily he laughs with them these days. His smile is nice when it’s real.

“Need a ride?” Andrew asks without looking, because it’s not quite natural, yet, being nice just because he likes them. Neil’s foot wiggles under his thigh where he’d been sitting on it, like he’s acknowledging it anyway, though.

Renee turns to smile at him, kisses her fingers and touches his hair. “If you’re not busy.”

The night of the concert, Renee looks lovely because she always does and Kevin looks like a normal twenty something going to a concert because Allison dressed him. Andrew walks in on them chatting as she mousses his hair in her room. Neil catches his eyes from where he’s sitting on her desk on his phone. He looks like Allison may have dressed him, too, since they figured they might as well stay out while Renee and Kevin are at the concert.

By the time Andrew and Neil make it back to the pick-up lot, Renee and Kevin are both as hyper as their personalities allow, grinning wide and flush when they approach the car. Renee has on a band shirt.

Neil twists around to face them when they get in, smiling bemusedly. “I guess it was fun?”

Andrew likes the sound of them chattering tonight, finds it more enjoyable background noise than music. Still, he doesn’t protest when Kevin admits to buying the bands CDs and Neil asks to play it even though they’re already a few minutes from pulling into the dorm. It doesn’t stop them from singing, even when Andrew ejects the CD and hands it back to Kevin, even when they get out of the car into what could suitably be described as public.

Renee tosses her head back and drags Kevin into her space, both of them shouting, “ _Louder than words!_ ”

Andrew has a picture saved on his phone—because Neil took it and Andrew never deleted it—of Kevin dancing with Renee that night, _dancing._ Every time he sees it, sees Renee smiling so big and Kevin looking so kind and happy in her arms, it makes him…something. He doesn’t try to name it, afraid he’ll chase it away, but he likes it in general and specifically, feeling it towards them.

The next morning, after she gets back from church, Renee comes into their room. Andrew and Neil wake up instantly at the sound, but relax when she smiles at them in her Sunday best. Andrew nods when she motions at one of his t-shirts draped over the back of a chair. Neil’s face comes into view, _yes or no_ , and Andrew lets him into his bed. Neil’s already half-asleep again by the time she’s changed into it, tiptoeing across the room in her stockings.

Renee doesn’t take Neil’s empty bed.

“ _She always wakes up late on Sundays,_ ” she sings softly, probably largely out of tune, but it’s enough to wake Kevin gently, with quiet laughter before she kneels on his bed. “ _She pours her coffee in a paper cup,_ ” they sing together as he rolls over to make space for her.

Coffee will wait, though, because it’s a Sunday and they have nowhere else to go. Renee was out later than usual last night and Kevin is as easy to wake as the dead on a good day, anyway. She presses her face into his shoulder, likely holding his hands under the blankets, too, sweet as can be. Their breathing evens out into a light doze and Andrew likes that; that they can doze with him in the room.

Andrew likes that any room with them is safe, too, so he can doze just as easily.


	6. Bohemian Rhapsody – Queen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “We will not let you go!”

They’re all out to dinner after getting home from an away game.

The other team had started unraveling towards the end, angry at getting their shit wrecked by the reject team, and Andrew had probably stoked the fire. Renee had only let two goals through—once tripping, the second a fake out she would _not_ fall for again—before she found a stride they couldn’t break. When the opposing striker called her a cunt when she walked past, smiling like she hadn’t heard him, Andrew decided to shut the fucking goal down in the second half on principal. In increasingly annoying ways.

It’s never been in Andrew to be a showman—he would argue, Kevin or Neil might disagree—but he does get a bit of childish glee out of how entertained Wymack looks. _Glee_ , what a life he’s living now. He keeps his expression neutral, even during Wymack’s customary “ _You did great, I’m proud of you all_ ” speech on the way home. Being able to feel pleased with someone else being pleased with him is still such an unfamiliar feeling, enough that it’s almost unsettling. Andrew doesn’t let himself pick it apart, not right now.

Betsy is waiting for them when they filter into the pizzeria, so are most of the cheer squad. She smiles as soon as she sees them, but Andrew thinks it brightens when he glances over to say, “Katelyn.”

Andrew can _feel_ the luminescence on Aaron’s face when Katelyn smiles at Andrew. “Andrew,” she says to him, then jumps at Aaron. “You guys did amazing!”

“Thanks, Katy,” Aaron kisses Katelyn’s cheek and she smiles at him like he’s hung the sun. When he notices Andrew is still looking, there’s a flicker of embarrassment, but none of the real fear that would’ve been there before. He even offers him a shy little smile and Andrew feels it like a hand around his heart.

Reaching for Neil’s hand on reflex, he offers a little nod back as Neil squeezes his fingers. “275%” he mumbles under his breath and Neil grins at him.

The moment is already pretty emotionally surreal for Andrew when the song starts.

In the waiting area of a crowded pizzeria, “ _Is this the real life?_ ” playing over the speakers is enough to send the room into some kind of frenzy.

A cheer goes up before everyone, loudly and off-key, joins in all at once. Even the waitstaff, even the little kids, even Wymack and Abby _._ Andrew spares a moment to wonder why _Aaron_ knows all the words to this song, but apparently every human being in the world knows “ _He’s just a poor boy, from a poor family!_ ”

The sound of Bee laughing delightedly behind him has him turning around to see her recording them on her cell. Andrew slips out of frame to stand beside her, watches her mouth along silently. Neil looks very confused by all this, but allows himself to be dragged under Matt’s arm as he shouts, “ _No, w_ _e will not let you go!_ ”

Allison is laughing in Kevin’s face as the Foxes and most of the restaurant sing along together and isn’t that just _touching?_

Andrew…well, he certainly feels _something_ about it.

Especially when the song ends and Bee turns to him, hands him her phone. He feels that same something in his chest go runny and sweet when she signs, [I’ll send you the recording.]

Andrew hates pointing out the obvious. His throat is too tight to speak, even if he had been feeling ready to try. [You Sign.]

Bee raises her eyebrows at him. [Of course. _You_ Sign.]

The whole thing leaves Andrew feeling so full, he nearly can’t eat.


	7. Heathens – Twenty One Pilots

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “You’re lovin’ on the freakshow sitting next to you.”

There’s always been something natural feeling about sparring with Renee, but it seems to only have gotten better since _they’ve_ gotten better.

Renee had been a hesitant constant in Andrew’s life since college started, but since embracing her like a real sibling, since learning what that _means_ , there’s a lightness to their matches. They chat breathlessly as they dance around each other, blocks and strikes thrown out between friendly, increasingly less one-sided, conversation. They still work hard, _God_ , do they; Andrew is faster sober and Renee has learned to deflect just about everything he can throw at her.

It’s nice, coming out the other side of a fight sore and tired, but not injured. Andrew can’t say he’s ever really missed out on not being able to just _talk_ to people, but he’s also…he isn’t sure he’s ever had friends before. Renee—he thinks even as she breathes out sharply through an elbow to the ribs and nails him with a groin shot that nearly buckles his knees and asks him how Aaron’s sparring with Matt is going—is probably his best friend.

That closeness is part of what makes their matches increasingly hard to finish, leading to them setting timers more often than struggling for a pin.

So, Andrew is more than a little surprised when he manages to actually throw Renee with a pretty simple takedown.

Renee lands flat on her back, which happens almost _never_ , but Andrew pauses when he sees she isn’t even guarding her face. With her hands laid out by her head, he realizes he was only able to pin her because she’s laughing so hard she’s got tears in her eyes.

Confused, he pulls back some. Quirks his brow. _What?_

“The s—The song—” she giggles, motioning vaguely towards the speakers on the ceiling. She legitimately _snorts._ “This song is _you_ —”

Andrew had tuned out the music pretty much as soon as he entered the gym, but pays attention just in time to hear the singer inform him: “ _All my friends are heathens, take it slow._ ”

The look Andrew gives her just makes her laugh some more before reaching up to tap his jaw with her fingers. “I’ve come to like my heathens.”

Andrew leans into her hand for a second before flicking her hair into her face. “You’re not funny.”

Renee takes his hands, still laughing as he tugs her to her feet.

(It’s maybe a little funny.)


	8. After Midnight – blink-182

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “I kinda like the little rush you get when you’re standing close to death.”

Neil only adds one song to the list.

There are no names on the list, no evidence of who added what, but Neil is the only one who knows about that night. Andrew hadn’t known the name of the song, but recognizes it instantly.

Andrew can admit most of the time, to himself at least, that the tide of good days is starting to outweigh the number of bad ones. There are days where everything is too much and the past feels closer than it has any real right to given how fucking hard he worked to get away from it.

He remembers the night, waking up from a nightmare trailing its fingers down his spine, squeezing his lungs in his chest. It’s one of the rare nights where Neil is beside him, but instead of having to force him out of the bed, instead of leaving the room for the roof, it makes him reach over to hold Neil’s wrist too tight. Neil didn’t startle, likely woke up the second Andrew jolted away, just turns to face him.

Neil speaks to him.

It’s his specialty, running off at the mouth, so he faces Andrew in the dark and starts talking and talking about nothing, until Andrew can loosen his grip, until he seems to run out of things to say. He whispers “ _Yes or no?_ ” and Andrew has to think about it in silence, before he nods and lets himself be drawn forward. He’s expecting a kiss and gets one, but this time to the top of his head as Neil pulls him onto his chest and starts humming.

It takes Andrew a while to place it, the song Neil had gotten stuck in his head the date they went on while Kevin and Renee were at their concert. The words “ _Did you know? I’m here to stay_ ” running through his mind and scattering his thoughts.

“You’re not a singer,” Andrew mutters when Neil takes a breath, to continue or start a new song, Andrew isn’t sure.

“Never said I was,” Neil replies, voice all sleep-rough again, breath stirring Andrew’s hair. He keeps humming anyway.

Then Andrew sleeps.

All of a sudden, on Neil’s chest, wrapped in someone and for once not thinking of the ways they could violate this closeness, Andrew sleeps.

In a few hours, he’ll wake up because he’s too hot. He’ll wake up slow and confused, to the sound of Neil’s heartbeat under his ear.

It’ll be enough to make him want to scream, wordless because there aren’t words for this.

Instead, he’ll lay there in shock until he can whisper “300%” and shove the covers off.


	9. Pause

The playlist is longer than that.

There are a few songs from the movies and shows they’ve watched on little nights. The song Nicky tends to hum to himself when he’s cleaning up and the Taylor Swift song Andrew heard getting screamed out of the girl’s locker room. Aaron and Matt probably had some combined effort in getting the videogame music added, but Seth had to have tossed in “ _What Does the Fox Say?_ ” because of how much they all love that Kevin and Wymack _hate_ it. All little bits and pieces of the happiest parts of the life they’ve lived together.

Andrew does not have a favorite _genre_ of music, but his favorite _type_ of music is any music that makes him feel something. And his positive feelings are reserved for a very select group of people.

Pulling out his phone, Andrew hesitates, but only for a moment, because Nicky told him he could and—and he wants to, he really does. He sends out a text.

> _Come back._

The door to the dorm opens less than five minutes later.

They aren’t to the point where Andrew can hug, not yet, but he can take Nicky’s hands and put his face on his shoulder. Nicky can breathe out shakily and rest his cheek on Andrew’s head, squeeze his fingers, and they can both understand each other.

I hear you and I feel you.

I’m listening and I’m here.

Funny how a playlist can feel a lot like a promise, too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading…I hope you dance today!
> 
> What’s your favorite song? Do you have any music head canons for the Foxes?


End file.
